So-called dark money organizations typically play to the extremes in politics, but one group is trying to build support in the center for its legislative priorities.
WorkMoney, a liberal political advocacy nonprofit, is trying to boost President Biden's multitrillion-dollar infrastructure and jobs agenda. It is spending $2 million on Facebook and Google ads to corral moderate Democrats and Republicans in the evenly divided Senate.
The group is one example of a dark money organization — a politically active nonprofit that is not required to disclose its donors and takes advantage of that leniency. Corporations, individuals and unions may make unlimited donations to such groups, increasing their influence over elections without any accompanying transparency.
WorkMoney describes itself as an organization "dedicated to lowering costs and raising incomes for all Americans, making American life more affordable and American families economically secure." The dark money group was created last year at the height of the pandemic.
CJ Grimes, a long-time union organizer who formed WorkMoney, told CNBC that her group has raised $20 million since its founding. According to the Facebook Ad Library, WorkMoney has spent more than $5 million for paid positions on the social media platform. And during the 2020 election, WorkMoney spent more than $230,000 supporting the campaigns of Biden and Georgia's new Democratic senators, Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, per filings with the Federal Election Commission.
The ads running on Facebook encourage viewers to "stand up for American jobs" and contact their elected officials. After clicking on the ad, viewers are taken to a separate website where they can "sign the petition" supporting the infrastructure legislation.
"Many in Congress are hearing from special interests, pushing to cut the parts of this plan that could really get our economy going," the website reads. "It's time to quit the partisan games and invest in real American jobs. Tell your Congressperson: Pass the American Jobs Plan."
Biden's wide-ranging $2 trillion package would rebuild roads and bridges across the country, remove all lead pipes from the nation's water system and invest in other infrastructure projects, while — its proponents claim — also generating millions of jobs. It also focuses on utilizing more renewable energy and addressing racial inequities in the economy. The president has said the legislation should be paid for by raising the corporate tax rate to 28 percent — up from the current 21 percent rate but still lower than it was prior to 2017.
The moderate lawmakers WorkMoney is targeting include Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, and Republican Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia.
"WorkMoney members are talking to moderate Republicans and moderate Democrats because they are the ones who are most likely to shape the legislation that ultimately passes," Grimes told CNBC. "These moderates on both sides of the aisle are the politicians who most need to hear from their constituents."
To pass in the Senate, the infrastructure legislation would need the support from all of these moderates, plus at least seven more Republicans, to reach the 60-vote threshold.
In 2020, dark money groups spent more than $1 billion on federal elections, according to OpenSecrets, continuing an exponential growth pattern that began when the Supreme Court opened the floodgates with its 2010 ruling in the Citizens United case.
Dark money had initially benefited Republicans more than Democrats, but the numbers have gone the other way over the past two election cycles.
U.S. President Donald Trump boards Air Force One on August 14, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. Trump is traveling to Long Island to tour law enforcement facilities in Nassau County and rally support for local Republican candidates ahead of the upcoming midterm elections
Travel Far Enough, You Meet Yourself
Is it possible that our President has simply not traveled enough?
Born and raised in Queens and attending Fordham University in the Bronx, Donald Trump has no record of traveling outside New York until he was over 20, when he transferred to a college in the neighboring state of Pennsylvania. Were his formative years amiss, then, in his learning about other places and other people?
Is his view akin to the famous New Yorker cover by Saul Steinberg, an illustration of the United States with New York City as the epicenter of the country and the Hudson River the border of the known world? We can now at least add Washington, D.C., and Mar-a-Lago to the map of “the realm.”
Our President has now traveled some, but what we recommend is another kind of travel. Not a state-sponsored trip or a venture to scout locations for future Trump Towers. This would be a genuine travel experience, enriching and eye-opening, showcasing other cultures and ways of living.
It will extend far beyond viewing military parades, hobnobbing with such “understanding” world leaders as Kim Jong Un, or taking tea with the King.
WHERE, then, should the President go? As Elon Musk’s Starship spacecraft is not yet ready to take passengers to Mars, perhaps he could explore our own vast country?
Maybe he could travel to “flyover country,” the farming states, where his ying-yanging tariffs and trade restrictions have played havoc with rural economies. Or possibly to California, number one in homeless U. S. citizens, and while there, regale homeless veterans (approximately 32,500 nationwide) with tales of his brave exploits invading and bombing foreign countries.
Or he might tour the Great Lakes, and rename the other four?
WHEN should he go? This will be tough, as he is very busy building his ballroom and renaming bodies of water.
How about a trip in early November, around the midterm elections? Despite the long-discredited accusation of widespread voter fraud, it would be reassuring to know he might be so caught up divvying out ladles of soup in a soup kitchen somewhere that he wouldn’t remember to deploy the military for “election security.”
HOW will he travel? He should definitely not take his Qatari-donated, newly renovated 747, especially after last time, when he had to be smuggled off clandestinely in a catering truck. It’s unlikely any traveling companions, like the Secretary of State or of the Treasury, are going to fall for the ruse a second time. Besides, we may need those people. No more decoys!
Perhaps the President could fly commercially, although this likely would expose him to undue suffering. Without gold bathroom fixtures and maple wood floors, the trip will be no “Luxury Experience.” If only he still had his “Trump Shuttle,” bought with a massive loan he later defaulted on, saying then, “I’m smart. I got out at a good time.”
Considering the potential pitfalls, maybe it’s best the President travel incognito, disguised perhaps as an elderly woman wearing a lot of bronzer.
Wherever, whenever, however: our President needs a vacation.
Moreover, we need a vacation from him.
If the President refuses our travel suggestions, here’s another idea:
Let’s get him a pet! He has never owned a pet. As we know with our children, pets teach essential life lessons: compassion and empathy; they instill a sense of responsibility. There is a well-established connection between those who can care for a pet and those who can care for people.
So, which pet should we choose? A puppy? A kitten? A boa constrictor?
Imagine, the President may even decide he likes having a pet. After all, what is more obedient than a well-trained dog, besides possibly the Cabinet? And what is more docile than a sweet kitten, other than plausibly the Supreme Court?
The President may even become more mellow with a pet afoot and less likely to slap tariffs on our allies, or attempt to annex our neighbors, or bully our Congress. (Realizing, of course, a bully requires active participation from the bullied to maintain his status.)
Maybe we should do both: get the President a pet and devise a travel plan for him. (Do you think we could possibly convince him to leave his phone at home?)
Let’s go for it! After all:
Travel far enough, you meet yourself. (David Mitchell)
And for our President, that would likely be the most profound discovery of all.
Amy Lockard is an Iowa resident who regularly contributes to regional newspapers and periodicals. She is working on the second of a four-book fictional series based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice."